Thursday, 24 May 2012

On May 24, several museums in Warsaw went on strike, closing their doors to the public. ZSP in Warsaw has been in solidarity with museum workers.

On
May 19, during the annual Museum Night event in Warsaw, members of ZSP
held an informational action about budget cuts in cultural institutions,
loss of jobs and repression of one worker who was involved in action to
save his work place.

A few cultural institutions in Warsaw will probably be liquidated
because of budget cuts, including the Technical Museum, the Warsaw
Chamber Opera and the Praha Cinema. We are in solidarity with the workers of these institutions, who are fighting against their closure.

Friday, 18 May 2012

Members of both ZSP and the Tenants' Defense Committee protested at the City Council on May 17. A group of parents were also present who successfully fought to overturn a huge increase in fees for nursery schools. The administrative court ruled against the City Council's decision... but then the City Council decided just to introduce a new rule about payment. This time, their idea was to charge parents an hourly rate for these schools and the effect is going to be just the same.

Some members of ZSP Warsaw who are members of the Tenants' Defense Committee are being sued for a video they made and posted on the internet where tenants describe their problems with their landlady and she is filmed in action. After months and months of delay, we were back in court on May 16. Nothing much happened and the case was postponed again until October.

Sunday, 13 May 2012

On May 13, ZSP picketed at another Empik bookstore in Warsaw, kicking off a national campaign against the chain. Contact with Empik workers started a couple of years ago when we received many denounciations against the firm from people around Poland during the "Worst Employer of the Year" contest. Every year, more and more employees wrote with the same complaints: unpaid overtime work, being forced to work while ill, having trash contracts, being forced to do heavy or dangerous work, lack of proper health and safety measures and mobbing. Now a few employees around Poland want to fight back and one is even suing the chain for unpaid overtime. And we offer our support to them and all workers who would like to organize.

In November 2011, a young worker, Karol M., suffered at accident at work on a construction site in Warsaw. He was employed illegally and did not have proper safety equipment, not even a helmet. He fell into a coma. The owner of the temporary work agency Jerzy Madziarowicz-MIX (also related to the property where the accident occurred) denied that Karol worked for him. The family, which was faced with the double horror of the accident and the financial consequences (since Karol was not insured), decided to fight, so that other workers would not be harmed by Madziarowicz and to get compensation for Karol.

On May 10, representatives of the Roche
headquarters in Basel organized a meeting with Roche Polska workers in
Warsaw. Since over 100 people attended, the meeting was held in a cinema
in the shopping mall next to the Warsaw office. We were informed of the
event so we organized an informational action.
First, leaflets were left in the cinema and posted around the
shopping mall. Security was tight and it was difficult to stay in one
place. Information about Roche practices were handed out also to people
in the shopping mall and then posted in the neighbouring area between
the mall and Roche offices.

Wednesday, 9 May 2012

The following is a personal opinion piece and does not necessarily reflect the view of everybody.

In recent weeks, I have been a little surprised by small rebellions and about-turns on the part of various authorities. In Poland we have become quite used to the fact that courts and controlling authorities usually take the side of those in power: bosses, landlords and city officials. But we have seen some small victories lately in legal matters.

Wednesday, 2 May 2012

On May 1 anarchists and anarchosyndicalists held a May Day march in Warsaw. During the march we spoke about the worsening situation of the working class: the widespread use of trash contracts, raising the retirement age and the capitalist attack on all that workers' had gained in the past hundred years. We criticized the mainstream unions, which compromise with the bosses and refuse to call strikes, even when faced with the most drastic of situations.